The place I chose to talk about is my house. It was built in the 80’s and has had improvements since my parents moved in. The house does not really take advantage of natural light. The front of the house faces south and there are windows on all four sides. The east and west side do not have as many windows as the north and south sides. Natural light does enter the home but not like we say in the Gable House. My bedroom has the most natural light in the evening because it is on the west side and the kitchen receives the most light in the morning because it is on the east side. Skylights and adding more windows on the east and west sides could help take advantage of the natural light.

 

My house manages temperature fairly well. During the spring and summer, there is a nice breeze that cools down the house except when it is one hundred degrees. In the fall and winter, the house is relatively warm. My house use to be shaded a lot better than it is today. There was a huge pine tree that covered half my house throughout the seasons, but it was cut down because we could not see out the bay window. I also had a cheery tree that covered another quarter of the house. This was replaced by a smaller tree that does not cover any of the house now. The only cover that my house has now is from a red maple tree that covers the garage. The house is very well insulated. It has the rolled up or batted insulation and also has blown in insulation. The only place where there is a draft is the laundry room. This is the room that has the oldest window in the house. This window does not do a very good job at keeping the wind out.

 

Heating my house is not a difficult thing to do. My mom likes to cook a lot so the stove is a very good generator of heat. This allows for our bedrooms to become warm because the kitchen in below the bedrooms. The house also keeps heat inside; so we do not really turn the heat on that much. We only turn the heat on until the house warms up to about 73 and then we turn it back off. The house usually stays warm unless someone leaves the door open or allows cold air in.

Curitiba is a thriving city now thanks to all the improvements. The city was redesigned around people not cars. There still are roads but the city is meant for people. The first thing that was built was a City Center. This showed residents that the government was serious about change and was going to go forward with it. The next thing the government did was use existing infrastructure. They tried not to knock down any buildings and used all the roads that were built already. They just used the existing infrastructure differently.  This also along with informing the people through education helped their city. With the existing roads, the city just changed the lanes and made the middle for buses. They went to double and triple articulated buses and new shelters for waiting. This made traffic and overcrowding absolute. Curitiba also said enough with flooding and decided to use water to their advantage. They made more man-made lakes and rivers and this ended flooding.

                With this taken care of Curitiba took to fighting poverty. They built affordable houses and allow poverty stricken people to make money. They told them to pick up garbage and they got food and toys for their families. This allowed for slums to get better. Also they gave the poverty people jobs. They let them build new neighborhoods that would get rid of slums. Since they were working on their house; they were allowed to buy them at a cheaper price.

Edna Sussman’s article had many interesting points about how municipalities control and change their affect on the climate. It was a tough choice to pick one to talk about, but I chose to talk about LEED certifications. LEED certifications, to me, are the most important part in changing how our buildings affect the climate. Once cities and towns start to push their building codes to have LEED in them, then it would eliminate one major problem with the climate.  My city that is doing this with their school district is Tinley Park. The school district is District 140. The school board has begun to make all schools and administration buildings LEED certified. This is a slow process but they feel it is the best for themselves and the community. The buildings were not made LEED but they are making them like LEED buildings.

Each year, they do something to a different building to make it more LEED certified. The school district has replaced old boilers with new high efficient boilers. Along with new boilers, they have put new air conditioning units in and new windows. Both of these are LEED certified products. The long fluorescent bulbs are placed in a machine that grinds them up and does not allow any containment into the air. The janitorial staff uses products made from the environment to clean all the schools. The transportation department uses new buses that have a preheat option. This allows the bus to be heated before they are turned on so idle time is reduced.  The buses are also plugged in but they are only turned on when the temperature is low enough and stays on for a certain amount of time. The schools also shut the air conditioning of in the summer. They do not cool the school off once the students are out of school. The water fountains are cooled only during the day and are shut off at night. Hot water heaters are only on during the school day and then shut off after school hours.

As you can see, the school district is doing something every year to reduce its impact on the world. They are leading the way for Tinley Park. Tinley Park should be proud to have a school like this in their boundaries. They can boast about having one of the most energy efficient  schools in the state and in the national.